Empowering Medical Librarians:
NLM Associates Program and the Network of African Medical Librarians
In 2001, NLM invited the first African medical librarian to be part of NLM’s year-long, primarily domestic, Associate Fellows Program. Since then, six librarians from the African continent have participated. These librarians and others from a total of seven academic institutions in Kenya, Mali, Mozambique, Nigeria, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe have now formed the Network of African Medical Librarians, an independent consortium with a secretariat at Kenyatta University in Kenya.
The Network’s vision is to strengthen health sciences education, research and outreach for better health outcomes in Africa. Their mission is to expand the frontiers of knowledge through the training of, and outreach to African librarians, the academic community, health care professionals, health policy makers in finding, organizing and using of health information.
The Network has been active in improving electronic access to research and health care information for researchers, students, health care workers and policy makers in Africa. To this end, the Network, with support from NLM, has developed a training manual titled Finding, Organising and Using Health Information, which is available in print and electronic formats. View the modules on the ADHL website here, under Online Courses.